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Templars
The Order of Companions of the Temple, commonly called the Templar Order or simply Templars, is a military religious order of knights founded in the late 7th century. Originally sworn to the defense of the Abbey of Tethar as companions of the Confessor Order, the Templars quickly came to be tasked with escorting and protecting Confessors that traveled Ovaicaea, and later were empowered as a military arm of the Confessor Order's political interests. Over time, the Templars expanded to include several commanderies in major cities and castle towns throughout Western Ovaicaea. Today, it boasts a diverse membership, committed to the ideals on which it was founded. Its military members guard the Confessor Abbey and numerous Confessor chapter houses, accompany traveling Confessors, and fight in expeditions on behalf of Confessor interests. Non-combatant members of the Templars, constituting as much as 60% of its membership, manage a large economic and educational infrastructure. The Templars own and operate banks, fighting academies, seminaries, forges, foundries, and workshops, and holds investment interests in farmland and industry, in support of their Order and the Confessors. History First Temple Period The Templars were founded in 679, as a fellowship of sixteen knights who swore a vow to protect Confessors who traveled throughout Ovaicaea, calling themselves the "Companions of the Temple". They dedicated themselves to a religious mission, believing the Confessors to be prophets of a new religious movement. The early Templar fellowship lodged their headquarters in southern Tolossia, in a chapel to Tyr in the city of Gerona. This building would later be referred to as the Old Chapter House. As the mendicant mission of the Confessor Order widened in the 7th century, so too did the need for protection, combat training, and education. The two orders acted in close cooperation, and starting in 712 the Templars were granted apartments in the Abbey and began stationing paladins there as defenders and as tutors in the martial arts. The Order relocated its headquarters there, and served as protectors of the temple and its inhabitants, as well as traveling knights who served the Confessor Order's agenda. Over the following century, they built up an infrastructure of fortifications and chapter houses as safe places of rest and defense for its members and for itinerant Confessors. The seeds of its later prosperous holdings were sown in this era, with the Order operating banks, forges, and workshops in major cities to provide financial resources to traveling parties. The first Templar-only fighting schools were founded in the human and dwarven kingdoms in the late 8th century, along with Templar-ran seminaries to train priests to serve the Order. By the beginning of the 9th century, the Templars established chapter houses and priories as far west as Eldunari and Balendor, as far north as Skyshroud, and even in Tethar and Gestrin. It developed a bureaucracy of regional Masters that held authority over all Templars in a single country, who all obeyed the Grand Master of the Order. While early on it was not difficult for the whole of the Order to meet annually to make decisions, as the Order grew exponentially it became unwieldy. The annual assembly was organized such that each commandery sent a representative to sit in the General Chapter. In 819, Mother Confessor Ilhandriel and two Sisters were escorted from the Abbey to the Orcish Khaganate by a party of Templar initiates from the Dorei Militia. They were slain by the Orcish khans, and the surviving knights fled across hostile territory to deliver the news. The killing of three Confessors was a major taboo of unofficial international law, and the human and dwarven kingdoms and Balendor rose up against the Khans. After the election of a child as Mother Confessor, both the Templars and Confessors split into factions. The division among the ranks threw both Orders into chaos, and the Confessors were unable to properly organize the war effort. The Templars attempted to mobilize their remaining knights and sergeants to act as shock troops against the Orcs, but it took time to reorganize after the schism. By the mid-820s, the Templars were able to field a proper force to support the efforts of the Dorei Militia and the local armies. In 833, an orcish raiding party made a daring trek across the Tethar Mountains to sack the Confessor Abbey. The Confessors and Templars there were butchered, and the headquarters were destroyed. The Grand Master died in combat protecting the young Mother Confessor, who was executed. The Order relocated to their priory in Skyshroud, directing their shattered remnants. The sacking of the Abbey galvanized the alliance, and the two previously-neutral nations of Skyshroud and Eldunari joined the war against the Orcs. The war effort came to be organized by Arya Hafwen, quartermaster-general of the Dorei Militia, and both the Templars and Confessors had conceded to her leadership. By 842, the devastated lands had been retaken and the Orcs were at last beaten back and contained to the Odkar Plateau in the northwest of Ovaicaea. The following year, the New Empire was founded from among the powers of the alliance, and General Hafwen was elected to be the first Empress. The Templar Order was granted status of imperial immediacy, with the Grand Master being legally subject to no-one but the imperial throne. However, in practice, the Grand Master of the Templars would take advice and instructions from the Mother Confessor. Second Temple Period In the reconstruction efforts after the war, the Abbey of Tethar was rebuilt and the Confessors took steps to bring back schismatics to the fold. The Templars were tasked with finding them and granting them amnesty, and seeking out new young women who manifested the power of Confession. The Templars established a base of operations in the newly-established Imperial City, building a fortress and complex to serve as a headquarters. They resumed control of their pre-existing properties and territories, and set to work restoring its castles, forts, and chapter houses across Ovaicaea. The next main issue to resolve was that of schismatic or heretical Templars. After the great schism in 821, many schismatics had fled and gone into hiding, taking up new lives or otherwise secretly evading the authorities. The schism had significantly reduced the manpower of the Templars during the war, and the lack of sufficient protection for travelers led to a breakdown in law and order as more Confessors fell prey to bandits or orc raids. The imperial states and kingdoms took these consequences seriously, and sought to charge breakaway Templars with disruption of the public peace. The Order claimed, after the war, that schismatic Templars were subject to the Order's sovereign justice; the Grand Procurator made a list of all known schismatics, had them tried in absentia, and sentenced them to death. A special chapter was established, under the direction of the Grand Procurator, to hunt down and execute those who had broken their oaths and split away from the Order. Between the chapter's founding 847 and the last known case in 967, over 2,000 schismatics were found and executed. Its mission was declared over and the chapter was officially dissolved in 970. Rumors and urban legend persist that the chapter secretly exists to hunt down fleeing oathbreakers, but there is nothing to corroborate this. In resuming their pre-war activities and rebuilding their properties, the Templars began to expand on their previous infrastructure. Templar banks, originally founded to provide financial resources for traveling Confessors, lent money to the Dorei Militia and other nations for the war effort. In charging interest on these loans, to be repaid after the war, these Templar banks became highly profitable institutions. Templar banks expanded their operations and have since become a cornerstone of capital finance in cities across the New Empire. A similar development was taken with their forges and workshops; while initially established to produce quality arms and armor for their own members, Templar craftsmanship became renowned after the war and sought by many. Lucrative contracts with the imperial guard have provided a steady supply of Templar steel, smelted from iron mined from the Skyshroud mountains. Using money from these ventures, the Templars have further invested into other business interests, including real estate, agriculture, trade, and various industries, including shipping, mining, milling, logging, pottery, and masonry. Templar properties today include not just castles and urban chapter houses, but large vineyards, ranches, and farms, and their castle towns are often economically self-sufficient due to trade. Some have criticized the Templars' involvement in trade networks linked to Gestrin, as it involved them by proxy with the slave trade, and one of the Templar precepts forbids involuntary service. Their investments in agriculture are similarly criticized, for supporting feudal land tenure and serfdom. However, the results have been a considerable increase in Templar financial and material resources, which has enabled them to fully fund their primary mission of protecting the Confessors, as well as secondary missions of charitable giving to the poor, escorting pilgrims, providing medical care, and conducting military operations in support of the Confessor Order's goals. The Templars have built and operate numerous hospices, infirmaries, fighting schools, military academies, and seminaries throughout Ovaicaea to support these missions.. Current organization The Templars were initially organized as a monastic order similar to previous orders of warrior monks. However, as its size increased, so did the complexity of its bureaucracy and the logistical requirements of the Order. All Templars are subject to the Grand Master, elected for life, who oversees the Order and represents the Order in the Imperial Assembly. The Grand Master presides over the General Chapter, ostensibly the assembly of all the priests and knights of the Order. Because of the logistical problems in assembling the members, who are spread over large distances, only deputations of the commanderies assemble to meet annually at the Grand Chapter House in the Imperial City. The geopolitical makeup of the Empire has determined the provincial structure of the Order. All Templars in a given province are led by a Master. The provinces are divided into several commanderies, and each city typically has a chapter house for Templar meetings within that commandery. Some more rural commanderies are instead centered around Templar-controlled castles or fortresses. The Grand Master exercises authority in the provinces through the Visitors-General of the order, knights specially appointed by the Grand Master to visit the order's provinces, correct malpractices, introduce new regulations, and resolve important disputes. The Visitors-General have the power to remove knights from office and to suspend the Master of the province concerned. The Grand Master is advised by a council of high officers vested with competencies over the entire Order, with some appointed by the Grand Master but most are elected on an annual basis by the General Chapter. These officers are as follows: * Grand Commander, deputy to the Grand Master. * Lord Protector, a special officer who commands the Templar garrison in the Confessor State, and who is responsible for the protection of the Abbey itself and the Mother Confessor. * Grand Marshal, responsible for military affairs, and the training and arming of soldiers. * Grand Cleric, responsible for religious affairs, and the training of priests. * Grand Chancellor, who is keeper of the seal and the Order's records. * Grand Treasurer, responsible for the Order's finances and banking institutions. * Grand Procurator, responsible for the Order's judicial affairs. * Grand Hospitaller, responsible for the Order's hospitals and public heath programs. No precise numbers are published, but it is estimated that there are around 20,000 Templars, of whom about a tenth are knights, some most of whom are paladins sworn to the Order's monastic oath, with a minority being lay knights. Around a third are non-knightly armed soldiers. The rest are noncombatant servants, bureaucrats, and professionals that manage and work in the Order's support structure. The Templars do not perform knighting ceremonies, so any knight wishing to become a Templar must be a knight already. In practice, many Templars independently induct squires into knighthood, enabling them to take the Order's monastic vows or to swear an oath as a lay knight of the Order. Ranks There is a four-fold division of the ranks within the Order: * Paladins, knights who are sworn to a monastic vow to defend the Confessors, serve the Temple, obey the Grand Master and all higher officers, and to adhere to the four noble virtues of knighthood. * Knights, lay nobles who are sworn to the Order's service but do not take monastic vows. Most knights are part-time members with outside military obligations, who serve with the Order for specified periods of service. * Sergeants, non-knightly warriors who take monastic vows. These make up the bulk of the Order's military forces, primarily infantry and mounted brothers- and sisters-at-arms. * Monks, noncombatants who have taken the Order's monastic vows and serve as priests, clerks, doctors, artisans, teachers, and servants. They constitute the majority of the Order's members.